VMware server on ReadyNAS 4.2.11

2010-05-25 Jan Olbrecht 2 Comments 19:03

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This is an updated and extended how-to, in which I will explain how you can install VMware Server 2 on the Netgear ReadyNAS PRO / 3200 / 4200 platform:

It applies to the following versions:

ReadyNAS firmware version Raidiator 4.2.11
VMware Server v2.0.2-203138.i386

First of all, let’s prepare:
1. Upgrade your ReadyNAS to the current firmware release using the Frontview control panel -> System -> Update -> Remote -> Reboot.
2. Decide on where you want to put your virtual machines, I decided to put them on a share of their own which I created. I called it “vm”. Create this share via Frontview. This makes sense in so far as VMware will create the files for virtual machines with “root” privileges, meaning only the root user will have access to these files via SMB or other access methods unless you reset share privileges via Frontview.
3. Decide where you want to put the ReadyNAS source code and VMware installation packages. I chose the already existing backup-share.
4. Install the EnableRootSSH addon to gain access to the ReadyNAS via SSH. You can download this add-on here: http://www.readynas.com/download/addons/x86/4.2/EnableRootSSH_1.0-x86.bin and install it via Frontview in System -> Update -> Local. Reboot.
5. You will need an ssh client such as putty.
6. You will need to register an account on vmware.com to download the free VMware Server. Get the i386 package, not the 64-bit package. This guide was compiled against version 2.0.2-203138.i386

Now let’s get started:
With putty, connect to your ReadyNAS and login as the “root” user. The password should be the same as your FrontView admin-password. You are now at the command prompt for your NAS.

#Note the following line:
Linux YOURNASNAME 2.6.33.4.RNx86_64.2.1 #1 SMP Wed May 19 19:36:51 PDT 2010 x86_64 GNU/Linux
#If you did all the earlier preparation right, your NAS will be running the x86_64 Linux Kernel in version 2.6.33.4. Let’s continue some preparations:

apt-get update && apt-get install build-essential

#This will install the necessary Linux components for compiling your kernel and VMware server. There will be a prompt if you really want to install these packages, as well as a prompt that a few packages could not be authenticated. Answer both with YES.

#Then let’s change into our work directory:
cd /c/backup
#We are now on the backup share. All shares you create via Frontview will be created within the directory /c/. Avoid using other Linux paths as they probably will be on the system partition of the NAS, which is only 5GB. It is not a good idea to have that run out of space.

#Then we will download the ReadyNAS GPL Package for Raidiator 4.2.11:
wget -q http://www.readynas.com/download/GPL/RNDP6xxx_4.2.11_WW_src.zip
#Let’s unpack it:
unzip -q RNDP6xxx_4.2.7_WW_src.zip -d ./GPL
#Now we will have to compile a new kernel to get the modules we need to run VMware Server.
cd GPL/linux-2.6.33.4
make ARCH=x86_64 oldconfig && make ARCH=x86_64
#This is going to take a while. You can go get another cup of coffee.

#We will need to tell Linux that we compiled a new kernel and its associated modules, as well as where to find it. For this we make a symbolic link:

ln -s /c/backup/GPL/linux-2.6.33.4/ /usr/src/linux
KERN_DIR=/usr/src/linux

#There has been a slight change in symlinks with kernel 2.6.32 onward which requires us to create two additional symlinks. Without these, VMware setup won’t work later on:

cd /usr/src/linux/include/linux
ln -s ../generated/utsrelease.h
ln -s ../generated/autoconf.h .

Now on to install the VMware server. First let’s copy the downloaded archive for the VMware server on the backup share.
Back in the ssh session, we’re going to unpack it, but first let’s change back into the backup share directory:

cd /c/backup
#and let’s unpack it:
gzip -d VMware-server-2.0.2-203138.i386.tar.gz
tar â€“xvf VMware-server-2.0.2-203138.i386.tar.gz

#Now we need to install some patches for VMware server to make it compatible with our kernel version:
wget http://risesecurity.org/~rcvalle/VMware-server-2.0.2-203138-update-2.patch

The following is taken from Ramon de Carvalho Valle at rise security (http://risesecurity.org/2010/04/02/vmware-server-2-0-2-update-patch-2/). Thanks to him for creating the patch.

#Extract VMware Server modules:
# Change working directory to vmware-server-distrib/lib/modules/source/
$ tar -xf vmci.tar
tar -xf vmmon.tar
tar -xf vmnet.tar
tar -xf vsock.tar

#Apply the patch:

#Change working directory to vmware-server-distrib/
patch -p1 < ../VMware-server-2.0.2-203138-update-2.patch

#Archive VMware Server modules again:

#Change working directory to vmware-server-distrib/lib/modules/source/
$ rm -f vmci.tar
rm -f vmmon.tar
rm -f vmnet.tar
rm -f vsock.tar
tar -cf vmci.tar vmci-only/
tar -cf vmmon.tar vmmon-only/
tar -cf vmnet.tar vmnet-only/
tar -cf vsock.tar vsock-only/

#And now let’s go install the VMware server:

cd vmware-server-distrib
./vmware-install.pl

#You will get several prompts now which you can all accept at face value except for one: You *must* change the default value for where to put the storage for virtual machines to a path within the /c/ directory. For this I prepared my “vm” share. Hence, I changed the path to “/c/vm/”. This is to make sure your virtual machines won’t kill the system volume of the ReadyNAS.

End notes and limitations:
Thanks to chirpa at the ReadyNAS forum for helping with my questions about the kernel and GPL package and for supplying me with early access to the GPL resources.
Enjoy.

Known limitations:
– The VMware server webinterface seems to have its issues on browsers other than Internet Explorer. I recommend you install the VMware Infrastructure Client to access the VMware host and its virtualised guests.
– Sometimes if you manually restart the VMware services by running “/etc/init.d/vmware restart”, the virtual network service does not want to properly restart. This requires re-running the configuration script “/usr/bin/vmware-config.pl”.

2 thoughts on “VMware server on ReadyNAS 4.2.11”

Jakkes says:

2010-09-07 at 22:43

Hello,

I tried to install VMware on a readynas pro 4.2.13.
Somehow it failed…..
The last entry’s:
arch/x86/boot/compressed/vmlinux.bin.lzma: No such file or directory
AS arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.o
gcc: arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.S: No such file or directory
gcc: no input files
make[2]: *** [arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [arch/x86/boot/compressed/vmlinux] Error 2
make: *** [bzImage] Error 2

When i run the command again it gives:
scripts/kconfig/conf -o arch/x86/Kconfig
#
# configuration written to .config
#
scripts/kconfig/conf -s arch/x86/Kconfig
CHK include/linux/version.h
CHK include/generated/utsrelease.h
CALL scripts/checksyscalls.sh
CHK include/generated/compile.h
LZMA arch/x86/boot/compressed/vmlinux.bin.lzma
/bin/sh: lzma: command not found
MKPIGGY arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.S
arch/x86/boot/compressed/vmlinux.bin.lzma: No such file or directory
AS arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.o
gcc: arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.S: No such file or directory
gcc: no input files
make[2]: *** [arch/x86/boot/compressed/piggy.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [arch/x86/boot/compressed/vmlinux] Error 2

Any change that i can succesfull install VMware?
Tijl says:

2010-12-12 at 01:41

Just install lzma:

apt-get install lzma
run the make command again

Comments are closed.

Issues preparing for upgrade to SCVMM 1801Issues preparing for upgrade to SCVMM 1801

I just ran into a small hickup upgrading my System Center Virtual Machine Manger 2016 to the new version 1801. I wasn’t able to find any documented cases of anyone running into this so here we go:

The upgrade to SCVMM 1801 actually requires uninstalling SCVMM 2016. This failed on my installation just at the point where I was clicking on the “Remove features” button in the setup dialog.

In C:\ProgramData\VMMLogs\SetupWizard.log I found the following entry:

11:52:28:Uncaught Exception: Threw Exception.Type: Microsoft.VirtualManager.Utils.CarmineException, Exception.Message: Unable to detect cluster configuration of the node.
Ensure that the user has permissions to detect cluster node configuration.
11:52:28:StackTrace: at Microsoft.VirtualManager.Setup.ClusterServiceHelper.get_IsAClusterNode()
 at Microsoft.VirtualManager.Setup.AddRemoveComponentsPage.EnterPage()
 at Microsoft.VirtualManager.SetupFramework.PageNavigation.WaitEnterSet(Page page)
 at Microsoft.VirtualManager.Setup.AddRemovePage.RemoveComponent_Click(Object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
 at System.Windows.EventRoute.InvokeHandlersImpl(Object source, RoutedEventArgs args, Boolean reRaised)
 at System.Windows.UIElement.RaiseEventImpl(DependencyObject sender, RoutedEventArgs args)
 at System.Windows.Controls.Primitives.ButtonBase.OnClick()
 at System.Windows.Controls.Button.OnClick()
 at System.Windows.Controls.Primitives.ButtonBase.OnMouseLeftButtonUp(MouseButtonEventArgs e)
 at System.Windows.RoutedEventArgs.InvokeHandler(Delegate handler, Object target)
 at System.Windows.RoutedEventHandlerInfo.InvokeHandler(Object target, RoutedEventArgs routedEventArgs)
 at System.Windows.EventRoute.InvokeHandlersImpl(Object source, RoutedEventArgs args, Boolean reRaised)
 at System.Windows.UIElement.ReRaiseEventAs(DependencyObject sender, RoutedEventArgs args, RoutedEvent newEvent)
 at System.Windows.UIElement.OnMouseUpThunk(Object sender, MouseButtonEventArgs e)
 at System.Windows.RoutedEventArgs.InvokeHandler(Delegate handler, Object target)
 at System.Windows.RoutedEventHandlerInfo.InvokeHandler(Object target, RoutedEventArgs routedEventArgs)
 at System.Windows.EventRoute.InvokeHandlersImpl(Object source, RoutedEventArgs args, Boolean reRaised)
 at System.Windows.UIElement.RaiseEventImpl(DependencyObject sender, RoutedEventArgs args)
 at System.Windows.UIElement.RaiseTrustedEvent(RoutedEventArgs args)
 at System.Windows.Input.InputManager.ProcessStagingArea()
 at System.Windows.Input.InputManager.ProcessInput(InputEventArgs input)
 at System.Windows.Input.InputProviderSite.ReportInput(InputReport inputReport)
 at System.Windows.Interop.HwndMouseInputProvider.ReportInput(IntPtr hwnd, InputMode mode, Int32 timestamp, RawMouseActions actions, Int32 x, Int32 y, Int32 wheel)
 at System.Windows.Interop.HwndMouseInputProvider.FilterMessage(IntPtr hwnd, WindowMessage msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam, Boolean& handled)
 at System.Windows.Interop.HwndSource.InputFilterMessage(IntPtr hwnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam, Boolean& handled)
 at MS.Win32.HwndWrapper.WndProc(IntPtr hwnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam, Boolean& handled)
 at MS.Win32.HwndSubclass.DispatcherCallbackOperation(Object o)
 at System.Windows.Threading.ExceptionWrapper.InternalRealCall(Delegate callback, Object args, Int32 numArgs)
 at System.Windows.Threading.ExceptionWrapper.TryCatchWhen(Object source, Delegate callback, Object args, Int32 numArgs, Delegate catchHandler)
 at System.Windows.Threading.Dispatcher.LegacyInvokeImpl(DispatcherPriority priority, TimeSpan timeout, Delegate method, Object args, Int32 numArgs)
 at MS.Win32.HwndSubclass.SubclassWndProc(IntPtr hwnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam)
 at MS.Win32.UnsafeNativeMethods.DispatchMessage(MSG& msg)
 at System.Windows.Threading.Dispatcher.PushFrameImpl(DispatcherFrame frame)
 at System.Windows.Application.RunDispatcher(Object ignore)
 at System.Windows.Application.RunInternal(Window window)
 at Microsoft.VirtualManager.Setup.Program.UiRun()
 at Microsoft.VirtualManager.Setup.Program.Main()

So what this means is that the setup is unsuccessfully trying to determine whether SCVMM is installed in a clustered setup. Which mine is not. Has never been.

The solution is to actually *install* the Windows Feature Failover Clustering. This way the check can run and setup will continue. There is no need to actually configure clustering.

Fixing Windows Admin Center ‘Can’t verify whether “cluster_name” is online’Fixing Windows Admin Center ‘Can’t verify whether “cluster_name” is online’

So you’re trying to add your Hyper-Converged Cluster to Windows Admin Center and it’s giving you the “Can’t verify whether “cluster_name” is online” treatment. You’ve checked DNS, upgraded WAC/Honolulu and tested installing it on multiple servers and workstations. Nothing helped. I have good news! for you:

I ran into this immediately after Project Honolulu became public and have been banging my head continuously. Here’s what to do:

Check the Event Viewer\Applications and Services Logs\Microsoft-ServerMangementExperience for the following entry:

400 - CimException: The xsi:type attribute (p1:MSCluster_Property_Node_PrivateProperties) does not identify an existing class.

This indicates your that WAC is connecting fine to your cluster but is running into an issue where it’s missing some cluster property.

I’ll have to give props to Robert Hochmayr here as he pointed me to the solution:

There are two private properties that are set on the cluster and its nodes which through some combination of events (like adding nodes to the cluster at a later point in time) are missing from nodes. You can find out by running the following PowerShell command on one of your S2D cluster nodes:

get-clusternode | Get-ClusterParameter

The output will look something like this:

Object Name Value Type
------ ---- ----- ----
S2D-01 S2DCacheBehavior 88 UInt64
S2D-01 S2DCacheDesiredState 2 UInt32
S2D-03 S2DCacheDesiredState 2 UInt32
S2D-03 S2DCacheBehavior 88 UInt64

Note that this was a four node cluster.. Nodes S2D-02 and S2D-04 are missing!

Off to the registry to fix it:

At HKLM\Cluster\Nodes\x\Parameters there should be two entries for the above cluster parameters. On my systems, the full registry key Parameters was missing from nodes 1 and 4 (go figure…). I added them *on each host* by running the following command lines:

REG ADD HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Cluster\Nodes\1\Parameters /f /vÂ  "S2DCacheBehavior" /t REG_QWORD /d "88"
REG ADD HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Cluster\Nodes\1\Parameters /f /v "S2DCacheDesiredState" /t REG_DWORD /d "2"
REG ADD HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Cluster\Nodes\4\Parameters /f /vÂ  "S2DCacheBehavior" /t REG_QWORD /d "88"
REG ADD HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Cluster\Nodes\4\Parameters /f /v "S2DCacheDesiredState" /t REG_DWORD /d "2"

Checking I now get the correct PowerShell output:

get-clusternode | Get-ClusterParameter

Object Name Value Type
------ ---- ----- ----
S2D-01 S2DCacheBehavior 88 UInt64
S2D-01 S2DCacheDesiredState 2 UInt32
S2D-02 S2DCacheBehavior 88 UInt64
S2D-02 S2DCacheDesiredState 2 UInt32
S2D-03 S2DCacheBehavior 88 UInt64
S2D-03 S2DCacheDesiredState 2 UInt32
S2D-04 S2DCacheBehavior 88 UInt64
S2D-04 S2DCacheDesiredState 2 UInt32

Once this was added I was immediately able to add the cluster to Windows Admin Center. No reboots or service restarts were needed.

-Jan

ThinkPad X1 Carbon (34602SG) – First impressionsThinkPad X1 Carbon (34602SG) – First impressions

Itâ€™s been a while since I had any interesting tech that I was actually able to write about. Today, that changed with the arrival of the brand-new Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon. For the international audience, I will write this and maybe a few follow-up articles in English as opposed to German.

Specs wise, itâ€™s pretty standard with the 3rd gen Core i5 3427U processor, 8GB of RAM and 256GB SSD. The Ericsson WWAN card is included, the USB 10/100 Mbit/s Ethernet adapter is not. Iâ€™ll have to check if and when I can expect delivery of that. I did not order from Lenovo directly, so I will have to go through my dealer for that. Anyway, enough has been written about the specs and parts in other places.

Because I havenâ€™t seen any other shots of a final system board, I included my own. As you can see, the RAM is soldered to the board. Opened up, more than half the system is taken up by its battery. Just to make clear: This was â€œjust for funâ€, there were no build issues whatsoever with my model that would have necessitated opening up the system. As far as build quality is concerned, this machine easily beats any one of the older ThinkPad models I owned or worked with. For the record: X21, T42p, T60p, T61, T400, T400s, T500, T410, T510, T420, X220, T430. Yes, I know thatâ€™s a lot but I spent quite a while in recent years supporting a fleet of ThinkPads for my last employer.

The X1 Carbon has probably the stiffest base Iâ€™ve ever experienced on a laptop. Thereâ€™s less give than I have in my 11â€ MacBook Air (2011) which is impressive, considering the X1 has a much larger chassis that could bend. Lenovo did change the color finish on the bezel and palm rest surrounding the keyboard. It is now much closer to the soft-touch finish normally found on the display cover. Oddly enough, I prefer its texture and softness to that of the new all-glass touchpad. Now, the latter is a big improvement to the touchpads found previously on ThinkPads (even the newer ones that started to be introduced with T400s). Its somehow not quite as smooth as you would expect from a glass touchpad â€“ something of a problem for me as I have dry skin and I noticed it had something of a sandpaper effect on my fingertips. For those who absolutely have to use a touchpad: The ones build by Apple are still the top of the crop. This being a ThinkPad however, thereâ€™s still the good-old TrackPoint and it hasnâ€™t changed a bit.

The LCD screen is of the TN persuasion and itâ€™s a pretty good one. Colors are vivid and the contrasts are excellent to my eyes. Other people have noted the LCD grid. The effect indeed is noticeable if you have really good vision and youâ€™re looking at a mostly white screen (e.g. MS Word). I mostly just noticed it because I read about it and looked for it. In regular use with what Iâ€™d call an ergonomic distance between your eyes and the screen itâ€™s much harder to see, certainly if you donâ€™t have perfect eyesight like me. The resolution is still spot on, 1600 by 900 on a 14â€ screen is the sweet spot for me. Itâ€™s enough to enable some multitasking on the road while keeping the machine portable. For serious work I still recommend a 24â€ or larger external screen.

I canâ€™t say I spent too much time with the stock Windows installation. Itâ€™s not as bad as other PCs Iâ€™ve seen (HP, Sony) but itâ€™s probably not worth keeping if you are the least bit technical and know how to install Windows and drivers. Itâ€™s a long shot from the Microsoft signature builds. Anyway, I wasnâ€™t going to have Windows 7 on this machine anyway and progressed to installing Windows 8 Professional RTM on it:

Hereâ€™s a couple of pointers that might help you avoid some of the stumbling blocks I met:

If youâ€™re going to install Windows 8 on this machine, put the setup files on a USB stick formatted with FAT32 (UEFI wonâ€™t boot the installer off NTFS).
Download all the drivers for the X1 Carbon from the Lenovo Beta site here except for Video and WWAN. Install these drivers first!
Now download the SCCM driver bundle for Windows 7 here. Also download the Intel Smart Connect drivers here. Unpack and point device manager to these folders to install drivers for all the remaining unrecognized devices.
Donâ€™t install beta Intel HD graphics drivers, use the update drivers function in device manager and have Windows pull new drivers off Windows Update
The Windows built-in driver for the Intel 6205 WLAN card has a wrong default setting: It doesnâ€™t have 802.11n mode enabled. If you donâ€™t enable that in device properties, you will likely only see 54Mbit/s connections. Newer drivers from Intel arenâ€™t available yet but should be out along with drivers for Intel Wireless Display by October 26th. Wireless antenna performance is great though, as I have come to expect from a ThinkPad. Full signal on the 5GHz band where my Mac struggles to keep a connection.
I didnâ€™t manage to get the WWAN card to work using the beta driver for Windows 8, the Windows 7 driver however worked perfectly.

Some general early impressions about system performance and such:

Itâ€™s very quick to boot and shut down running Windows 8. Resume from stand-by is nearly instantaneous.
Battery runtime for me seems to be around 5 hours right now with the power profile set to balanced, the display at around half its maximum brightness, WLAN and WWAN enabled. This includes time when the system was still syncing data from my SkyDrive and Exchange mailbox in Outlook, indexing and me installing all the little tools I like to have at the ready. Given that weâ€™re still very early as far as driver support for Windows 8 goes (and that I believe Lenovoâ€™s Power Manager still has some extra tricks that are not yet available), Iâ€™m pretty happy with that. Recharging the battery using rapid charge takes care of remaining worries.
As a touch typist and die-hard ThinkPad enthusiast, the new keyboard is easy to get used to. I still miss the 7th-row key placements and keys like â€œpauseâ€ but itâ€™s something you get used to pretty quickly. Key feel and responsiveness is nice and key travel is better than any other Ultrabook (or Macbook) Iâ€™ve tried before. I especially like how the keyboard on the X1 Carbon is a part of the bezel. Itâ€™s a much cleaner and nicer visual look which I found distracting on the T430.
You might want to keep credit cards away from the bottom left corner of the base. Thatâ€™s where you find the magnet keeping the lid closed.

Thatâ€™s it for my early thoughts. The X1 Carbon for me is the perfect workhorse computer right now. I donâ€™t need computationally intensive applications on a daily basis (thatâ€™s what servers and desktops are for!) and I appreciate the portability. Iâ€™ll probably buy a second power supply and Iâ€™m seriously considering the USB 3.0 dock.

Otherwise this computer is what I always thought the Macbook Air should have been: Black, no-nonsense, non-glare, non-shiny, all serious, with a great keyboard and a little red dot right smack-dab in the middle where it belongs.